


it's gonna be forever

by jdphoenix



Series: they'll tell you [2]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, One Shot Collection, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-31
Updated: 2015-06-13
Packaged: 2018-03-20 12:10:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3649860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <strike><br/>    <em>or it's gonna go down in flames</em><br/>  </strike>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>He doesn’t need fantasies, he just needs time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. love's a game

**Author's Note:**

> These are tumblr-prompted follow-ups to _they'll tell you I'm insane_ , so it's little looks at Grant and Jemma following those events instead of a natural story progression.
> 
> All titles (and the quote in the summary) come from Taylor Swift's "Blank Space."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The request was for four months after "they'll tell you I'm insane."

Jemma might be a little bit crazy. Okay, she is  _definitely_  crazy, but she can’t just let this neurotoxin finish production! And it’s not like this particular hallway is above her clearance level, it’s just … well, she’s not supposed to be here.

“Hey, you! You’re not supposed to be here.” 

She rolls her eyes even as fear grips her.  _Calm down_ , she tells herself firmly. If she feels guilty, she will appear guilty, and then they will search her and find the production order she’s stolen off the division commander’s desk.

Everything will be fine. She just has to talk her way out of this. Which she can do. Probably.

She turns to offer some excuse (she hasn’t actually thought of one yet. Possibly something about getting lost on the way to the ladies’?) to what appears to be a whole battalion of HYDRA soldiers. Oh, lord, this is not good.

“Yeah, she is,” a familiar voice says and a hand stops the man in the lead.

All of the soldiers appear as though they’ve just returned from the field (perhaps an altercation with SHIELD?) but the one who steps forward is smiling. Ward leaves the others behind to approach her with a broad smile.

“Hey,” he says easily, “looking for me?”

“Oh. Yes?” She’s not sure what he’s playing at - now or ever, honestly. He claims he’s here to protect her, to ensure the continued success of her mission, and he seems to be honest. If he wasn’t, wouldn’t she have been locked away and tortured by now? But he never tells her what he’s up to. He just  _does it_  and expects her to follow along.

After he approached her with his offer of help, she could have run back to Coulson and abandoned the mission entirely. She should have. He’s dangerous and unpredictable and half of why she left the Playground in the first place, but she risked trusting him anyway. The next day he appeared in her lab with a polite hello and relief she’d ended up on the “right” side of things when SHIELD fell. She couldn’t go anywhere for the rest of the day without someone asking her how she knew  _the_  Grant Ward. Was it true he’d jumped out of a plane to save her life? Was it true she’d saved his a time or two in return? 

She was off-kilter for hours, until Bakshi stopped by to see her. He was impressed, he said, that she’d made such powerful friends in the days of SHIELD and that she hadn’t tried to worm her way higher in HYDRA’s ranks through them. Not that he  _agreed_  with her tactics, but he appreciated them, and invited her to join the panel working on a new neurotoxin. The same neurotoxin that has landed Jemma in this hallway at this unfortunate moment in time.

“Are you hurt?” she asks, noting the grime clinging to his skin. There’s definitely the rusty hint of blood in there, but she can’t be sure of its origin through the dirt.

Ward doesn’t slow as he comes nearer and she realizes only when his hand wraps around her arm what he’s about. He pulls, forcing her to close the last distance between them, and catches her up in his arms. And then he’s kissing her.

She’s absurdly aware of everything. The whistles from the men. The way the hard angles of his tac vest dig into her breasts. The crinkle of the memo in her pocket. The smell of sweat and dirt clinging to him. 

And of course the kiss, underscoring everything else. He’s well past the five o’clock shadow point and she feels a faintly pleasant burn as he moves against her. 

And as she moves against him. 

He’s got a bruising grip on her back and head - to keep her from pulling away and ruining his deception, she assumes - but there’s no need. Her fingers are twisted in the straps and pockets of the vest, tugging her up closer to him. And she almost hates him because he’s absolutely determined to keep the kiss chaste when all she wants is to deepen it, to have part of him inside her.

And  _that_  is enough of  _that._

Her grip slackens and he lowers her carefully to the floor. The hand on her head slides around to cup her cheek and lingers there. “Lemme get cleaned up and then we’ll get something to eat, okay? I‘ll meet you in your lab?”

She nods stiffly. Her body is still throbbing but her mind- Well, to be perfectly honest, her mind is already revisiting the kiss. Apparently the surprise at realizing she wanted, even for a moment, to have sex with Ward, is secondary to the pleasure of kissing him.

He nudges her towards the nearest door to the rest of the building - the parts she is definitely allowed in - and as the door falls shut behind her, she hears the distinct sounds of men congratulating one of their own on a job well done. She feels a twinge of annoyance but it’s a distant thing. 

She sags against the wall beside the door, trying to focus on the slowing of her heart and the evening out of her breath. She’s smart enough to know he’s just changed the dynamic between their covers. She can’t blame him - it was an effective way of throwing off any suspicion of her presence there - but it complicates things. 

Whatever their official status after this, it will require more of … of that. Had she known when she left the Playground that this was even a remote possibility, she never would have come. She left to  _escape_ him, to escape the sight of him and the constant fear that he would succeed in taking his own life and her own softening heart towards him. And now he’s here every day and he’s kissed her - kissed her like he had all the time in the world to do it and it would still never be enough. 

He’s changed everything and even though she’s terrified of what comes next, she can’t say she’s sorry. 


	2. we'll take this way too far

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this case the requester didn't give me a specific timeframe, only asked for more. So this takes place sometime after the previous installment.

Jemma’s pacing the floor, agonizing over the progression of their relationship. Grant knows there’s a pile of magazines in her closet - some legitimately scientific, but most trashy rags - that she used to plot out the prospective course of their office romance. She’s got charts and calendars and scripts. He thinks it’s adorable.

He also thinks they should fuck for real instead of just pretending to have quickies in janitors’ closets. But he’s willing to wait. These meetings are plenty for now. As far as HYDRA is concerned, he’s spending his rest and recuperation time sleeping over at his girlfriend’s place. What they don’t know is that he sleeps on the floor. 

Anyone else might be frustrated -  _more_  frustrated - but it’s  _her_  floor. It’s  _her_ room and  _her_  apartment. Everything here is hers. He’s eating her food and using her shower and breathing her air. If he’d even been able to imagine this a few months ago, back in that cell, it would’ve overwhelmed him. But now, now that he’s out in the world again, it’s almost not enough.

He catches her arm at the elbow as she passes by the couch. She doesn’t stop moving, but when his hand slides down to hers, she grips his fingers and turns back, shortening her circuit to keep the contact.

She was the one who insisted on physical contact during these meetings. “To acclimate ourselves,” she explained brightly. “So neither of us jumps just because the other tries to hold their hand.”

“I don’t jump,” he pointed out.

Her expression dropped. “Well  _I_  do, so you’ll just have to endure. You’re the one who got us in this mess, after all.” 

She’s a quicker study than he would have guessed, but she’s determined that they can’t be lax in their practice. That in mind, he gives a little tug, pulling her across his lap. 

“ _Grant_ ,” she says, slapping him with the papers in her hands. She’s taken to calling him that all the time to avoid unfortunate mix-ups.

“ _Jemma?_ ” he asks innocently. If she thinks it’s odd that he, with all his training, calls her that all the time too, she hasn’t mentioned. He releases her hand but only to start trailing his fingers idly up and down her leg. (He really wishes she wasn’t wearing pants.) She shifts in his lap.

“Actually…” Whatever cross words were on her tongue drift away and he almost lets himself hope she’s about to say she wants what he does. Not that she doesn’t  _want_  to. He can feel it every time they kiss for the benefit of their coworkers and the way she’s currently playing with the buttons of his shirt is definitely promising. She’s just not there yet. 

She has her plans about their relationship and he has his own, only his aren’t about putting on a front. And by his estimate, she’s still got a few weeks.

A flush is moving up her chest and her precious charts are wrinkling in her grip. “This is going to sound odd.” Her eyes are on the bit of chest visible above his buttons.

“That’s kind of our normal.”

Her mouth quirks up, but only for a moment. She stops her fiddling and lets her gaze drift away as she braces herself for whatever she's about to say. Her weight shifts over him and he has to fight to keep in control. “I need you to-  _tomarkme_.” She peeks up at him from beneath her brows. “Did you hear what I said?”

Oh yeah. He definitely heard what she said. He’s just not sure he  _understood_. Because there is no way, according to his timeline, that Jemma just asked him to do that to her.

He must nod because she carries on, gesturing weakly to her charts. “You see, it’s Bakshi. Obviously he doesn’t really see me that way, but this is the third time you’ve come back from a mission and found the two of us together. It’s understandable that you wouldn’t make a scene, what with him being your superior and all, but a show of jealousy is warranted.”

He doesn’t have an answer for that because there are just so many things wrong with what she just said. First of all, Bakshi  _absolutely_  sees her like that. And, that being said, Grant  _definitely_  would have made a scene - superior or no - except it would set back his own plans for Jemma.

“Since you‘re leaving again tomorrow,” she says, needing to fill the silence somehow, “the simplest route is for you to leave some physical sign of your position in my life to warn off other men while you’re gone.”

Part of him warns that he should ask again, that she cannot possibly be serious and he should give her every chance to back out. But that part of him is small compared to what’s left of the man who spent six months in a cage longing for her.

His hand around her waist tightens, just to hold her steady, and his other hand abandons his exploration of her leg to cup her cheek, forcing her to face him. Her eyes are wide, her lips slightly parted in anticipation. He leans in as if to kiss her and only at the last moment reminds himself that he can’t, not yet. He turns her chin away and presses his lips to her jaw, just below her ear. It’s too high for her collars to cover and just far enough forward that she won’t be able to keep it hidden with her hair, not in the lab.

He bites down gently. He can feel her trying to hold back her reaction, her body stiff and still atop him. Her hand tries to fist in the couch but finds his leg instead and she’s too far gone to let go. Her back arches, just a little, pushing her breasts up so he can feel the curve of one against his shirt. There’s a high-pitched whine caught in her throat, barely audible over his own pounding heart. He soothes the spot with a brief flick of his tongue and another kiss and - _God_ , she tastes better than he'd dreamed - reluctantly, pulls back.

Her eyes are closed and her breathing shallow. He trails his fingers slowly along her jaw, enjoying the sight of her like this, before leaning back. His grip on her waist eases and he returns his attentions to her leg, bringing them back to where they were before. Or at least bringing himself. She takes a few moments longer to get herself under control. Maybe, he thinks, he can move up his timetable a bit.

She touches the spot at her neck. It’s red and angry and will leave an impressive bruise. He’s proud of it, actually.

“Thank you,” she says.

He laughs and soon she does too. She tries to transition that into climbing off him but he holds her in place.

“While we’re on the subject,” he says, “of things we can do to strengthen the charade…” He increases the pressure on her leg. “Maybe you could invest in a skirt or two - just for when I’m in town.”

She purses her lips. “That’s hardly professional.”

“Plenty of women at the office wear skirts. There were even SHIELD uniforms with skirts. Besides, they provide better access.”

It doesn’t take a second for her to figure what he means and she slaps him again with her papers. “ _You_  are horrible.” She climbs off him and heads for the kitchen.

“And everyone at HYDRA knows that,” he calls after her, but doesn’t follow to argue the point. If she listens, she listens. If she doesn’t, he has something to dream about. He closes his eyes.

A kiss. One without bystanders and one she definitely wanted to continue. It’s an important first step and one he has every intention of building on. Soon. 

Not now though. For now he reclines on the couch, content with the sounds she’s making in the kitchen and the simple Jemma-ness of the space around him. It’s enough, for now at least.


	3. we're young and we're reckless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, no specified timeframe from the prompter, but this takes place five days after the last chapter.

Grant is covered in dust from halfway around the world. Every inch of him feels dry and filthy, sweat and blood and dust clinging to him everywhere. A shower would be good, but it’s not the first thing on his mind. Jemma is.

Not that that’s unusual. If she’s not at the forefront of his mind these days, she’s hovering around the edges, never quite leaving his periphery. So when he climbs off the chopper, he doesn’t head into the waiting showers, but down to the labs.

She might complain - if not about the dust he’ll track in, then about him showing too much affection - but he’s ready for that. Or the latter anyway, the dust is unavoidable. This little charade started when she was, supposedly, meeting him on a return from a mission. And that was one that went by the book. This one went to all kinds of hell and has him coming in over twenty-four hours late. He was fine with not running to her the second he got back when the plan was to be gone for only three days - he  _prepared_  for three days and that kiss she asked him for definitely helped - but every second beyond that has been agony worse than being stuck in that cell.

He can’t tell her any of that, of course, but he did very publicly promise to meet her for lunch today so she could double-check the HYDRA medics’ work patching him up. It’s nearly five now and he figures a very public reassurance of her fears is in order.

The wide lab windows give him a good view of her before he even makes the door. She’s sitting on a stool, bent over her work - not busy at it though, just puttering along and using the table to help keep her somewhat upright. It could just be Friday laziness, but Grant thinks (hopes) it might be something else.

One of her fellow techs catches sight of him coming and smiles - definitely a good sign. The woman nudges Jemma as she makes herself scarce, but Jemma’s so out of it that she doesn’t notice the pointed nod.

“What?” she asks the retreating woman.

“I think she’s trying to let you know you have a visitor,” Grant says. He only gets half of it out before Jemma’s leaping off of the stool and into his arms.

“Grant!” She hugs him tight enough to hurt and he has to fight back the urge to return it. She buries her face in his neck. “I was so worried.”

He mumbles something about not being that easy to get rid of, but he’s a little distracted. He’s got his hands laced under her to keep her up and the edge of his palm has just brushed bare skin.

She’s wearing a skirt.

She’s wearing a  _fucking skirt_  to welcome him home.

And that is definitely the wrong adjective to use. He’s trying to get a handle on his desires when she pulls back.

“Sorry,” she says, wiping the dust out of her eyes. She leans back, indicating she’d like to be set down. He only almost doesn’t let her go. “We heard about how bad things had gone out there,” she explains.

Grant does not like the sound of that. HYDRA is even more hardassed about that kind of thing than SHIELD was. There’s no way the gossip mill just happened to give Jemma news about what was going on out there. Which means someone with some real authority made sure she heard. 

Grant’s money’s on Bakshi, who’s always been a little too interested in their relationship. He’s gonna have to keep a closer eye on the man in the future. But that’ll have to wait, right now he’s got a show to put on.

“I just wanted to see you,” he says, trailing a hand down her face. He likes the dirty stain he leaves behind almost as much as the still-visible mark on her neck. He brushes his thumb over it and she gasps softly, her eyes fluttering. “I don’t know how long the debriefing’ll take, so I’ll see you later?”

“Tonight,” she insists. 

He grins. Even the techs here who’ve never done field work have to know a debriefing like this could easily take hours. It’s a good play, implying she’ll want to see him no matter how long it takes. Jemma’s still not a great liar though, so at least some of that insistence is real. Probably it’s because she wants to tear him a new one for this or, at the very least, talk shop. But some of it might be genuine concern. Her fingers still tangled in his jacket certainly imply as much.

“Tonight,” he agrees, reluctantly pulling her hands away. He steps back, allowing himself a moment to take in the sight of her. The skirt - and he did not seriously think she’d do it but there’s no way he’s complaining - isn’t immodest, so it must’ve gotten bunched up under the stool and then his hands, but it’s got a nice pleat to it. That’ll make it easier to ruck up around her hips so he can-

He pushes the thoughts away as he leaves. He’s got several dull hours of debriefs to get to, he can’t afford to be any more distracted than he already will be. Seeing her, holding her again, along with promise of seeing her tonight - even without the possibility of sex - is already tugging his thoughts further and further away from the mission. He doesn’t need the added distraction of fantasies.

And he doesn’t want them either. Jemma’s here and, as far as everyone else is concerned, she’s his. He’s got time to make the real thing happen. He doesn’t need fantasies.


	4. a nightmare dressed like a daydream

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The request was for four weeks after "the marking incident" (aka chapter 2).

The darkness gives way to bright light so suddenly that Jemma actually cries out. She curls her head down towards her chest, screwing her eyes shut. A hand digs into the hairs at the front of her scalp and tugs, forcing her to open her eyes and look up.

May would know how to fight back or at least how to endure the pain. 

Tears leak from the corners of Jemma’s eyes. Her vision is all blurs. Greys and whites hovering amid the sea of burning white. She can make out the screen fixed to the wall directly ahead of her. Still black, thankfully. She knows enough of what HYDRA uses these rooms for to know that once they decide to turn that screen on, she’ll never truly escape this place.

She can make out the face of the guard holding her, hard and uncompromising, but he isn’t the only one here. Someone else came in the door behind her along with him. Is it just another guard come to torment her? Is it Morse or Bakshi come to start the real torture? …Is it Grant?

“How are we feeling this morning?” Bakshi asks, coming around to loom over her. “More talkative, I hope.”

Skye would say something smart, that she was hungry or had to pee or that this was the worst hotel she’d ever stayed at. 

Jemma’s tongue feels like lead.

Bakshi gives the guard a silent signal and the pull on Jemma’s head lets up. She can’t help the sigh she lets out or the sag of her shoulders. Bakshi catches her under the chin before she can relax too far. He’s not harsh in his touch, if anything he’s almost kind. His fingers are cold.

“Nothing to say?”

She’s not Skye. She won’t be making it through this on brave mockery and sarcasm. And she’s certainly not May either. What’s coming - what she knows to be coming - will have her wishing for death. But in this moment, she can hold firm. She keeps her mouth firmly shut.

Bakshi trails his knuckles along her cheek, following the path of her earlier tears. “Pity.”

 

 

 

 

She’s having lunch with her colleagues, discussing the bioweapon they’re meant to be developing. It’s terribly important and just the sort of thing she's here to study so she can report on it to Coulson. Only Grant is eating with them and he seems preoccupied with her knee.

Natalie is saying something, something Jemma _needs_ to hear, but Grant’s lazy circles have pushed the hem of her skirt up and his voice is rough in her ear. “I like you in skirts.”

There’s warmth pooling between her legs. Natalie and the dining hall drift away as Grant’s touch becomes more insistent, leaving them curled up on Jemma's couch. He nuzzles the side of her head and trails kisses up to her temple. Pain burns through her and she shrieks.

“There she is!” Jemma doesn’t know the name of the wild looking man, though she thinks he might have been introduced to her when he was brought in. (Have to keep things civil, after all.) She only knows he’s madder than he appears. He explains everything to her so she knows just what’s about to be done before it happens. In one breath he apologizes and in the next he- well, she doesn’t much want to put into words the enjoyment he clearly gets from hurting her, but she knows if she survives this, his face will haunt her nightmares for some time to come.

“There’s my pretty bird,” he says, tapping her cheek like she’s a fine specimen. “Anything you’d like to say for the benevolent overlords?” He looks invitingly to one of the many cameras embedded in the walls. “No? Eh, too bad.” And he begins again.

 

 

 

 

She’s sitting in Vault D, asking the question that’s been weighing on her. Why does he keep doing this? Isn’t he afraid? Doesn’t he care that he’s scaring-

Doesn’t he _care_? About anything?

“Why do you keep saving it?”

Because she has to. Because she wants to. Because she has to be able to save someone and he’s the only one left who will let her.

“After all I’ve done, do you really think I’m worth any of this?”

Of _course_ he is. He’s a person and a life and that is always worth _something_.

“Really?” Fitz asks. He’s pale in the hospital gown he wore for three long weeks while she waited for him to wake up. There are dark marks on his arms from the tubes that ran into him, keeping him alive when she couldn’t. “You think he’s worth _anything_ after what he did to me? To us?”

She reaches for him. “Fitz, no-”

“You left me! For him! So you could be with him!”

“No! I didn’t! It’s a cover. It’s just a cover.”

He paces the shattered remains of the lab, glass crunching under his feet. “I don’t care if there was a gun to your head! You let him _touch_ you. You _wanted_ him to!”

“He’s changed,” she says weakly. She turns back to Grant, sitting on the edge of his bed, wearing his full HYDRA-issue gear, and waiting patiently for her to return to him. “Haven’t you?”

He smiles and pulls her into his lap for a kiss. He has. He’s trying to make amends, just like he said. She pulls back, smiling.

“Of course I have,” he says, but it’s wrong. His voice and his face, they’re cold and cocky like when he caught them back in that shed. “But you already knew that.”

 

 

 

 

“Bad dream?” the madman - she refuses to call him a doctor - asks mildly when she wakes up. When he tells her what he’s putting in the syringe, she wishes she’d stayed asleep. “You can talk for this part, you know. This isn’t the question and answer portion. This is the part where we chat. Admittedly, it’s the part where I try to forge a bond with you so that you’ll feel more comfortable opening up when you inevitably break, but I’m not really concerned with that.” He lifts a terribly impressive knife, throws her a disappointed look, and sets it aside. 

It hasn’t escaped her notice that while he certainly has the means to brutalize her, he hasn’t done anything that will leave a lasting mark. They don’t want her carrying any reminders of what happens here. She’s sure once they’ve broken her, they’re going to put her back together as one of their wind-up HYDRA toys. So she’s not going to open up to her torturer, she’s not going to help things move along faster. It may hurt just to breathe right now, but at least she’s in control of her own mind.

“Suit yourself,” the madman says, bringing the syringe over. “Now, I haven’t actually tried these particular drugs in conjunction before, so you’ll have to tell me how it feels.” He presses the needle into her skin. 

She can swear she feels the drugs burning through her veins. Her heart is pounding in her ears and her breath is coming fast. Too fast. He blurs in her vision.

“Oh, that’s not good,” he says, pulling at her eyelids to get a better look.

She thinks she might scream, but she isn’t sure she has the strength to.

 

 

 

 

She’s falling through the air, watching him coming after her. She wants to throttle him for putting himself in danger when she’s already dead even while she wants to cry with relief.

 

 

 

 

“What did you do?” Bakshi roars.

“She’s not dead. She’s just not quite alive at the moment. Now if you’ll let me work…”

 

 

 

 

“Coulson sent you?” she asks, still aiming the gun at his heart. May would have pulled the trigger by now. Skye too, surely. Coulson would come and clean up the body and rub her back while he told her she’d done the right thing. So why hasn’t she killed him yet?

“No,” he says, holding his arms wide. She sees now why. She didn’t sew him back up just to break him. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t help you.”

 

 

 

 

“You said this would work. Why isn’t it working, doctor?”

“Well, if I had to guess, I’d say it’s because the anticoagulant doesn’t do any good when her heart’s not pumping.”

 

 

 

 

“You think that boyfriend of yours can protect you?” Morse asks.

“I don’t need protecting because I haven’t _done_ anything. And I’ll thank you not to bring my personal relationship into this.”

“You brought it into this when you started dating an agent. Did you think he’d protect you when it all came out? Or maybe- oh, _Simmons_ , is it love?”

 

 

 

 

“Clear!”

…

“Clear!”

…

“Clear!”

 

 

 

 

The too-small raft bobs on the waves while they await rescue. He’s got one arm draped over her back, holding her secure. She’s got her ear pressed to his chest, reassured the steady thrum of his heartbeat.

 

 

 

 

The lights are dim when she wakes up, laid out on a table. There are no cuffs holding her in place, but there isn’t much need. Her whole body hurts so badly. She can’t even _think_ about moving.

She can see the chair from here, the one they had her strapped to all night. And the madman’s tools are strewn over the floor. She must be lying on his table.

The door opens. Morse. Jemma wants to cry. She doesn’t have the energy to face the woman now. But it seems luck is on her side because Morse is only holding the door open for Jemma’s real visitors: a trio of soldiers, Bakshi, and …

All she sees is Grant, filthy and still in his tac vest, obviously fresh off his latest mission. Did they call him back just for this?

She’s vaguely aware of Morse leaving, the sound of the door closing, Bakshi’s cruel words. But more than anything, she sees that sardonic twist of Grant’s smile. He interrupts whatever Bakshi’s saying. “So this is the part where I kill my girlfriend to prove my loyalty?” He’s still watching her, staring like she’s a mildly interesting species of bug. Something in the vicinity of her heart cracks.

“She’s proving wholly uncooperative and I’m afraid the good doctor went a little overboard. If we move forward with the questioning, we sacrifice the chance to turn her. If we turn her, we risk damaging any useful intelligence she holds.” The way Bakshi says it, it sounds like she’s no more trouble than a performance that runs into a dinner reservation. 

Grant strolls casually closer, taking the long route around the back of the chair. He toes a broken syringe on the floor, then bends down to pick up the knife the madman brandished at her earlier. “So you’re avoiding choosing by bringing me down here,” he surmises, examining the edge.

“You were always going to be brought down here,” Bakshi says. “We couldn’t have you plotting revenge.”

Grant grins toothily. “Over _her_?” He gestures with the knife and then spins it between his hands while he chuckles. His eyes land on her again and his smile turns into something that might be characterized as apologetic. “Nothing personal.”

She should fight back. May would. Skye would. But everything still hurts so much, more than it did before even, and part of her thinks he might be kind enough to make it fast.

He brushes away the hair that’s sticking to her forehead, but she recognizes the steel in his hand. He’s holding her in place. She sees the flash of the knife. 

She should have shot him.

“For old time‘s sake?” he asks, and leans down to kiss her one last time. 

He tastes like salt and dust. 

She should at least turn away, refuse to give this to him, but she kisses him back because if it’s gonna be the last time, she wants all she can get. She can feel his arm lifting up, lifting the knife, and then a swift, sharp movement. He’s gone, moved away out of her sight. She’s dying. She must be dying. Only she doesn’t feel anything but the same pain and the lingering pleasure of his kiss.

There are noises. Men cry out. Bakshi is yelling something, his voice strained. And then he screams and it turns ugly and gurgling.

Grant is back, his hands everywhere, promising to kill them all, to get her to safety, to never let her go again. He lifts her up into his arms and she sees bits and pieces of the carnage he rendered. Bakshi, she sees, is most definitely dead. She curls into his chest, trying to hold back sobs of fear and relief.

The door flies open. “Are you done yet?” Morse snaps. She sees the bodies. “Oh good. Let’s get going.”

Morse is on their side? There’s a _their_ side? 

Jemma is tired, more tired than she’s ever been, and it’s all she can do to keep awake in case Grant has to put her on her feet as they flee the facility.

He kisses the top of her head. “You’re safe. I’ve got you.”

She allows herself to relax in his arms. She can’t think of anyplace safer.


	5. if the high was worth the pain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An anon requested 72 hours after "a nightmare dressed like a daydream." (And it certainly took me long enough to get to it.)

Dealing with the doctor took longer than Grant expected. He can hear Jemma tossing and turning as he hurries down the hall to the room he‘s got her in. The sedative is wearing off, along with the painkillers.

He doesn’t stop once he’s through the door, just goes straight for the bed, and catches her hand off the thick comforter. She’s still too warm, but it’s not as bad as it was earlier.

Her movements grow increasingly erratic. By the time her eyes snap open, he’s had to climb half-onto the mattress to hold her down for fear she’ll hurt herself. He watches her face relax, only for the horror of her nightmares to be replaced with the horror of reality.

“It’s okay,” he says, shushing her and climbing fully atop the mattress to pull her into his arms. “It’s okay. You’re safe.” She clings to him, her fingers digging into his back and shoulders while she cries into his shirt.

It’s terrible, but he’s grateful for this moment. He hates how they got here and wishes he’d had time to take the proper care killing the men holding her, but there are few things in life that would give him more pleasure than having Jemma in his lap, holding onto him for dear life. His most optimistic estimates for their relationship put this kind of contact nearly a month out. Bakshi, may he rot in hell, has pushed up that timetable.

But in order for him to get to this point, he had to almost lose her. He restrains himself from holding her as tightly as he’d like. Just the memory of her lying on that table is enough to have his blood boiling.

“I won’t let anyone hurt you,” he says, pressing the words to her hair in a kiss.

She freezes, and he worries he’s made a misstep. They’re not undercover anymore. There’s no need for practice brushes of skin or staged displays of affection. Neither of them can pretend he doesn’t mean the intimate contact.

Slowly her head tilts back so she can look him in the eye. He’s terrified. Oh, not that he’s ruined his chances. If she reacts badly, he can work through it, get her back on track with a little effort. But he doesn’t want her getting _off_ track. He’s waited months to have her here, and his entire being rebels at the thought of having to give up a single inch of his gains.

“You saved me,” she says. Her voice is raw and hollow and it must hurt to speak. His hand convulses on her shoulder.

“I told you I’d protect you,” he reminds her. He knows she didn’t believe him back when he broke into her apartment all those weeks ago with his offer of help, and from her expression, it’s clear she still didn’t.

It must have been terrifying for her, trapped in that room, unsure whether help was ever going to come. His fingers itch to curl into fists. He lets her go to grab the waiting pills off the bedside table. She takes them without protest, tossing them back and following them up with a drink of water. He runs a hand up and down her back, gentle but firm.

“I know I’ve made mistakes,” he says, avoiding her eyes as he sets the glass aside, “but I would never let anyone hurt you. If I’d known sooner what they were doing…” He drops his head down. After a moment, he’s rewarded with a faint kiss to the top of his head.

“Thank you,” she says sincerely.

His eyes drift shut. He wants to enjoy this.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t last. She’s gotta be exhausted - this is the longest she’s been conscious in days, and the first time he’s seen her truly lucid since he left for the mission that took him away from her so HYDRA could do this to her. She eases out of his lap and he reluctantly lets her go. There’ll be other chances, other nightmares, and soon enough he won’t even need them.

“You could-” Her cut off sentence stops him half-way off the bed. He turns back and finds her looking resolutely at the ceiling. She takes a breath - not a deep one, not with her injuries - and looks to him. “Would you mind staying?”

He has to fight to keep his smile from showing through full-force. “Of course,” he says, and sits against the headboard. She shifts closer to him and he obligingly drapes one arm over her head to rest on her shoulder.

“What happened?” she asks after several long, agonizing minutes in which her fingers play with the seams on the hip of his jeans.

He takes a deep breath as the last three days come back to him. They were easily the longest of his life. “We got out,” he says unnecessarily. She doesn't need to know the specifics - that he left Morse where Trip would find her and ran off before they could throw him back in that cell. “I found a doctor to treat you, one who didn’t ask too many questions. We’re safe here for a few more days. Long enough for you to get your strength back.”

She looks around the room, lifting her head off the pillows to get a better view. “And where is here?” she asks on a yawn.

“One of my brother’s houses,” he says, then tips his head to one side. “Well, my sister-in-law’s now. She took the kids out of town to get away from the press.”

She hums deep in her throat. He told her weeks ago, when she tried to broach the subject of his brother’s death, that it was a weight off his mind, Christian finally confessing like that, even if it had to happen in conjunction with something so horrible.

“We’re safe,” he says again.

She doesn’t answer. Her fingers go on tracing his hip until her breathing evens out and she drifts off to sleep.

He gives it another twenty minutes, and most of that is just for the simple pleasure of being close to her without having to guard himself. He lets her overwhelm him with the rise and fall of her chest, the steady beat of pulse in her wrist, her warmth bleeding through the blankets. He could fall asleep here too if he isn’t careful.

Finally he tears himself away, closing her carefully inside the room. His boots are where he left them, dropped on the pristine white tile of the foyer downstairs. Thick black and red from the mud outside is splattered around them. He cleans it up hurriedly, not wanting Jemma to see if she manages to get herself out of bed. That done, he pulls the burner phone he bought in town from his bag and dials.

It picks up on the first ring. “Where is she?” Coulson asks.

“Safe,” Grant says, looking up the stairs. He can’t see the bedroom door from here, but he can still feel her warmth lingering in his side.

“I sincerely doubt that. Tell me where she is, and I won’t let Trip shoot you in the head.”

Grant hisses in a breath. “Not much incentive there. Still plenty of body parts for him to aim for.”

“Caught that, did you?”

Enough fun, this isn’t a social call. “I’m calling to tell you to stop looking. Jemma’s safe with me. I’m not letting you put her in danger again.”

“Honestly, Ward, I can’t think of a lot of situations more dangerous than being with you.”

Grant smiles to himself. “For you? Very true. But her, I like. Don’t worry. She’ll be fine. Unless you make it difficult for me to keep her safe, that is.”

“Ward-”

He hangs up. The threat, while necessary, leaves him feeling dirty. He would never hurt Jemma, but he needs the team to think he would. For the moment, she’s the only leverage he has over them. He can’t risk them taking her back and putting her right back in the line of fire. She nearly died, and all because Coulson put her safety in the hands of some woman who only saw her as a job.

Grant tosses the phone aside - he won’t be using it again - and takes several deep, calming breaths. Once he’s sure he’s got himself under control, he heads back upstairs.

Jemma’s still out cold, but when he settles in next to her, she reaches for him in her sleep. He smiles and closes his eyes on her peaceful face.


End file.
